Apparatus for indicating or governing speed.



No. $797,500. PATENTED AUG. 15, 1905. L. COWEY. PPAEATUS PQR INDIGATING 0R GOVERNING SPEED.

APPLIGATIQN man 15u15, 1904.

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PATENTBD AUG. 15, 1905.

L. E. COWEY. APPARATUS POR INDIGATING OR GOVERNING SPEED.

APPLICATION FILED MAY 16, 1904.

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APPARATUS FOFi` INDICATING OR GOVERNING SPEED- Specification of Letters Patent.

Patented Aug. 15, 1905.

Application filed May 16, 1904. Serial No. 208,190.

To all zul/1,0171, t may concer-71,.-

Be it known that I, LEONARD EUGENE OowEY, engineer, a subject of the King of Great Britain, residing at l5 Victoria Parade, Kew Gardens, in the county of Surrey, England, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Apparatus for Indicating or Governing Speed, of which the following is a specification.

This invention has reference to apparatus for indicating or governing speed and when employed as a speed-indicator is particularly applicable for use on road-vehicles, such as motor-cars.

According to my invention the apparatus comprises, essentially, a rotary member which is subject to the action of two forces tending to turn or angularly displace it about its axis of rotation in opposite directions, one of said forces being continuous and the other intermittent in its action. The continuous force is applied by means of a spring, and the intermitteut force is applied by means of a device which is operated by some suitable moving part of the machine whose speed is to be indicated or governed. The intermittent force is preferably applied by means of a propelling` device which is so constructed and arranged that at the moment of engaging' with the rotary member it will be moving in the same direction and approximately at the same velocity as that portion of the rotary member' with which it engages, so that at such time there will exist no relative movement of rotation between these parts about the axis of the rotary member.

In order that my said invention may be clearly understood and readily carried into effect, I will describe the same more fully with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which- Figure l is a front elevation of the apparatus. Eig. 2 is a vertical central cross-section of the same. Fig. 3 is a Vertical section taken approximately on the line l l of Fig. 2 looking toward the left. Fig. L is a vertical section taken approximately on the line 2 2 of Eig. 2 looking toward the right. Fig. 5 is a horizontal section taken approximately on the line 3 3 of Fig. 4. Fig'. 6 is a detail cross-section on the line 4 4 of Eig. 5. Fig. 7 is a detail sectional plan on the line 5 5 of Eig. 2.

A is the rotary member, which is in the rform of a toothed or serrated wheel, and A is the spring to the action of which said wheel A is subjected, so that in Fig. 4 the spring A' tends to move the wheel A in a direction the same as that of the hands of a clock.

B is the device for intermittently propelling the wheel A against the resistance of said spring, which device B (in Fig. 4) tends to move the wheel A in a direction opposite to that of the hands of a clock.

O is the casing of the apparatus.

The intermittent propelling device is in the example illustrated in the form of a bellcrank or double-armed lever carried by a pin b, which is eccentrically mounted on a toothed disk or drum b, capable of revolving on an axle b2, fixed to the casing of the apparatus. One limb of the said lever is provided with a toothed or serrated surface LX, which tends to engage with the toothed or serrated periphery of the wheel A under the influence of a spring 3, Fig. 3, and the other limb 7)* is bent or cam-shaped to cooperate with a fixed stud or pin 1f in such manner as to cause the lever to move about its fulcrum Z1 against the resistance of the said spring 3. The disk or drum bf receives motion from a toothed pinion b, which is carried by a spindle 717, that is driven by one of the road-wheels or other suitable rotary part of the vehicle through a iiexible shaft bx or otherwise. The aforesaid spring A' is shown of helical form,with one end furnished with a chain, cord, or other iiexible coupling' A, Fig. 4, which is adapted to Abe wound upon a volute surface A3 of the said wheel A, said surface being advantageously in the form of a snail-cam or watch-fusee. As the said disk or wheel 7) revolves it causes the bell-crank lever to operate in such a manner that its serrated or toothed surface 5X moves in a path somewhat resembling that indicated by the dotted lines in Fig. -that is to say, the said toothed surface will at the moment of engaging with the toothed or serrated periphery of the wheel A be moving in the same direction and at approximately the saine velocity as that portion of the wheel with which it engages, will then be gradually brought to rest, will reverse the direction of movement of the wheel A, will move the latter angularly against the resistance of its spring', will again stop it, and will then release it, this cycle of operations being performed at each revolution of the said disk or drum b. The aforesaid wheel A has a spindle c, the opposite ends of which are supported by bearings c a2, the former of which is made capable of adjustment and is carried by the back plate e of the casing of the apparatus. rIhe other, a, is carried by a plate or partition c near the front of the apparatus. Loosely mounted on the front bearing e2 is a toothed pinion 0,3, which gears with another pinion a", carried by a spindle a5, which when the apparatus is used as a speed-indicator carries the index or pointer A", that travels clockwise over a suitably-graduated dial affixed to the plate c. The toothed pinion a3 is retained in place with the necessary amount of friction by a forkarmed spring @"X, which is secured to the back of the plate or partition c. rIhe said disk or drum Il may be made with a transverse central cavity If', Fig. 5, closed by a screw-plug L1", for containing lubricant, such as vaseline, which lies in contact with the axle Z22 and the pin It will be found desirable to so arrange the index or pointer A1 that the small oscillations which the wheel A performs during the working of the apparatus under the opposite influences of the spring A and 'the intermittent propelling device B will not be transmitted to said index or pointers-vl. e., the latter will only be infiuenced by a forward or backward angular movement of the wheel A due to a change of speed and not by the small angular movements due to the aforesaid influences. This may be effected by providing the said loose pinion a3 with recesses at a, Fig. 6, on its face adjacent to the spindle a for the reception of radial projections fon said spindle, the relative proportions of the recesses and projections being such that there will exist a certain amount of free play between these parts. The said spring A of the wheel A and also the spring' 2) of the intermittent propelling device may be furnished with means for enabling them to be adjusted so as to regulate their resistance in accordance with requirements. For adjusting the spring A, I prefer to employ a bracket c3, Figs. 2 and 4, which is held in place by a screw c4 passing through a slot c therein, so as to enable the bracket to be adjusted in the direction to regulate the tension of the spring. The lower end of the bracket has grooves or depressions c" c", which are covered by a detachable plate c7. These grooves or depressions are so formed that the end of the spring' will engage therewith and permit of the said'end being more or less projected therethrough by turning the spring axially. The effective length of the spring can thus be very conveniently adjusted.

In some cases I provide in addition to the index or pointer A'L another index or pointer A, adapted to remain in the position to which it is set, so as to record the maximum speed indicated by the apparatus, suitable means being .provided for enabling' it to be reset to Zero when desired. For this purpose I may mount in the glass or other transparent front cs of the apparatus a loose .bush (its, having' on its exterior a milled head for enabling' it to be actuated by hand from the outsidel of the apparatus. Its inner surface has a conical cavity into which is adapted to be sprung a conical boss a of the maximum index or pointer A", said conical vboss being split or divided and made of steel or other resilient material to permit of its being thus sprung into place. The position of the said bush (t8 is of course such that its axis of revolution coincides with that of the pointer A". The pointer A" has a pin am, which lies in the path of the other pointer, so thatI as the pointer A'i travels forward by the movement it receives from the wheel A it will carry with it the maximum pointer, the latter remaining unaffected by the rearward movement of the said pointer Af. rIhe amount of friction existing between the split conical boss of the pointer A5 and the bush as is slight to permit the said maximum pointer to readily move in the bush when actuated by the pointer A"` but sui'licient to enable it to move with said bush when the latter is actuated for returning the maximum pointer to Zero.

Then the apparatus is in operation, it will be obvious from what has already been stated above that the intermittent propelling device will alternately impel the wheel Ain a direction to overcome the resistance of its spring and release it again. lf the speed of movement of the intermittent propelling device be very slow, then the interval of time existing' between each impulse---that is to say, the period of disengagement between the propelling device and the wheel A-will be long enough to enable the spring of the said wheel A to react and return the latter a considerable distance toward its starting-point; but as the speed of movement of the said intermittent propelling device increases this time interval will diminish, with the result that the propelling device will give a greater number of impulses to the wheel A in a given time and cause it to move through an increased angle. The greater this angle becomes, however, the greater will be the resistance exerted by the said spring A of the wheel A, and consequently the more rapidly will the Said wheel tend to return during the times that the propelling device is out of contact therewith. Thus the greater the speed of the disk or wheel Il the greater will be the angular movement of the wheel A. Vhen the angular distance through which this wheel moves forward at each impulse is equal to that which the spring is able to return it backward, no further movement beyond the oscillations caused by these two forces will be transmitted to the wheel, and therefore to the pointer Af.

If the apparatus be required to indicate the distance traveled by the vehicle, as well as the speed thereof, I combine with it an odometer D of any suitable kind and connect the same with one of the vehicle-wheels or other suitable part of the vehicle in any appropriate manner, so that it will indicate the number of revolutions of said wheel inmiles, yards, or such like. .In the example illustrated the said odometer is provided with a worm-wheel (Z, gearing With a Worm d on the spindle 57, that carries the toothed pinion b.

I wish it to be understood that although the aforesaid intermittent propelling' device above described is of the kind I prefer to employ I do not desire to be limited thereto, as any other form ot' such device may be used for my purpose.

Vhat I claim, and desire to secure by Letters Patent of the United States. is-

1. In speed-indicating apparatus, the combination of a rotary member, an indicating device actuated by said rotary member, means for imparting to said rotary member a continuous tendency to turn in one direction, means for intermittently imparting to said rotary member a tendency to turn in the opposite direction, and means for keeping said intermittently-operating means from engaging' the rotary member until it has acquired approximately the same velocity as said rotary member for the purpose specified.

2. In speed-indicating apparatus, the combination of a rotary member, an indicating device actuated by said rotary member, a spring for imparting to the rotary member a continuous tendency to turn in one direction, a propelling' device for intermittently imparting to said rotary member a tendency to turn in opposition to its spring, and means for keepingthe propelling device from engaging the rotary member until it has acquired approximately the same velocity and direction of movement as that of the rotary member at the time otengaging therewith for the purpose specified.

3. In speed-indicating apparatus, the combination of a serrated Wheel, an indicating device actuated by said wheel, a spring for imparting to said wheel a continuous tendency to turn in one direction, a double-armed lever provided at one end with a serrated segment for engaging with the said serrated wheel and at the other end with a cam-piece, a rotary disk or drum on which said double-armed lever is eccentrically mounted, a spring tending to keep the serrated segment in engagement with the serrated Wheel, a fixed projection with which the cam-piece cooperates for causing said serrated segment to disengage the serrated wheel, and means for revolving the rotary disk or drum from some moving part ot' the machine whose speed is to be indicated, substantially as described.

4. In speed-indicating apparatus, the combination of a serrated wheel, a pointer actuated by said wheel, a spring for imparting to said wheel a continuous tendency to turn in one direction, a double-armed lever provided at one end with a serrated segment for engaging with said serrated wheel and at the other end with a cam-piece, a rotary toothed disk or drum on which said double-armed lever is eccentrieally mounted, a spring tending to keep the serrated segment in engagement with the serrated wheel, a fixed projection with which the cam-piece cooperates Jfor causing said serrated segment to disengage the serrated wheel, a toothed pinion engaging with said toothed disk or drum and a flexible shaft transmitting motion to said toothed pinion from some moving part of the machine whose speed is to be indicated substantially as described.

5. In speed-indicating apparatus, the combination of a serrated wheel, a spindle carrying said wheel, a pointer movable over a graduated dial, a toothed pinion actuating said pointer and loosely mounted with respect to the serrated Wheel, a spring for exerting fric-' tion on said loose pinion, projections on said spindle a loose pinion having' wide recesses with which said projections engage, a spring for imparting rotary motion to said serrated wheel, a propelling device for imparting to said serrated wheel intermittent motion in the reverse direction to that due to said spring, and means 't'or actuating said propelling device from some moving part of the machine whose speed is to be indicated substantially as described.

6. In speed-indicating apparatus, the combination with the serrated wheel its spring and its intermittent propeller, of an indicatingpointer actuated by said wheel a graduated dial over which the said pointer travels, a maximum pointer situated coaxial with respect to the first-mentioned pointer, a movable conically-recessed bush mounted in the glass front of the apparatus and operative l'rom the exterior, a split conical boss on said maximum pointer movably engaging with the conicallyrecessed bush, and means whereby the firstmentioned pointer imparts a forward motion to the maximum pointer, substantially as and for the purpose specified.

In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand, in presence of two subscribing witnesses, this 31st day of March, 1904.

LEONARD EUGENE COVEI Vilitnesses:

T. Sumar IVARDLE, lVAL'rnR J. SiiuirrnN. 

